Chandigarh: A team of experts will check water samples of Sukhna lake where some geese were culled after an avian flu scare even as authorities say there was no fresh case of any deaths of birds.

"The incubation period of the avian influenza is upto seven days and it is over now," Chandigarh Animal Husbandry Department Joint Director, Lovelesh Kant Gupta said on Tuesday.

There is no fresh case of any bird found dead from any part of the region, he said, adding no patient with symptoms of flu had reported in the hospitals.

Gupta said that an expert team from National Institute of High Security Animal Diseases Laboratory, Bhopal and Regional Disease Diagnostic Laboratory (RDDL), Jalandhar, have arrived in the city to collect water samples of Sukhna lake.

"The team will start its job tomorrow," he said, adding that Sukhna lake will remain close till January 18.

He said that there were reports from parts of Punjab, including Tarn Taran, Jalandhar, Mohali and parts of Haryana, including Pinjore, Panchkula and Jind of crows and geese dying recently.

He attributed this to pesticides thrown by farmers in their fields.

Gupta, however, said the samples of dead birds had been sent to Jalandhar laboratory and that there is no ban on poultry products across the region.

"Any non-vegetarian can eat what he likes, but provided the food is properly cooked," he said.

He asserted that there was no need to panic as the situation is far normal.

About reports of few fishes dying in Sukhna lake and other parts of the region, he said that fishes never die due to avian influenza. "Its the chilly condition that at times is behind the death of a fish," he said.

Meanwhile, samples from poultry farms located in the close vicinity of the Sukhna lake and places continued, Sub Divisional Magistrate (Central) Prince Dhawan, who is UT's Nodal officer dealing with the avian flu, said.

However, in the wake of bird flu scare, the authorities at various zoos and wetlands across Punjab and Haryana, have intensified monitoring and surveillance of the birds.

After a sample of geese from Sukhna lake here tested positive for bird flu, authorities culled over 100 geese on December 18 on the island in the middle of the lake.

The entire culling operation was carried out as a precautionary measure to prevent any outbreak of bird flu in the city and adjoining areas.